Losing My Religion

“They’ve been moving on and on. Getting further apart. They’re so far off by now that they could never think of coming to the bus stop at all. Astronomical distances. There’s a bit of rising ground near where I live and a chap has a telescope. You can see the lights of the inhabited houses, where those old ones live, millions of miles away. Millions of miles from us and from one another. Every now and then they move further still.” —C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce

A good friend of mine recently confessed, “I am giving up on organized religion.” He had been in an Episcopal parish that had torn itself apart over issues of human sexuality, with many conservatives splitting off to form a new congregation. It didn’t help his attitude that the new congregation soon split again.

He has witnessed what he describes as hate coming from newly formed denominations. He is a tenderhearted individual, so I am not surprised by his revulsion, but I believe he is not alone. Except for the highly partisan, people have little tolerance for the ugliness that has spawned in so many churches. It would seem a good hypothesis that the rise of nones (religiously unaffiliated) is fueled in large measure by this. Cue R.E.M.’s 1991 classic “Losing My Religion.”

I am not going to defend the way these conflicts have played out, either from the progressive or the traditional side. Nor am I going to suggest a way to end such conflicts. I want to go to a different place that looks at my friend’s decision to give up on organized religion. Something there points to a deeper, more important issue.

In a sense, giving up on organized religion is in the same boat as spiritual but not religious. In both cases, there is a large kernel of truth. When organized religions eat and devour one another (Gal. 5:15), they clearly have strayed from the call to love one another. The excuse that they are just standing for the truth is negated by the methods they use to defend that truth. Speaking the truth in love (Eph. 4:15) is not easy, especially when emotions run high. That people flee such places where truth is often spoken without love is not surprising, and those people should be commended for it.

Likewise, those who self-describe as spiritual but not religious correctly point to a deep truth. Humans add requirements that can deny deeper things. Jesus was pointing to this when he said,

“You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)— then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.” (Mark 7:9-13, NIV)

While dropping organized religion and being spiritual but not religious serve as a judgment on human religions and can call us back to key principles lost along the way, both reactions lead almost inevitably to an unhealthy individualism. There is a reason that religions become organized. It is because humans were made to live in community. And if one is going to live in a community, there must be organization. This does not mean hierarchy, necessarily; authority structures are not even necessary (although in our current state of brokenness it is hard to imagine how we can live in community without such structures). If you put even two people together, they will need to order their common life.

But living in community is hard! There is not space to list what drives us crazy when we come together. It is to be expected that our groups, without a lot of intentional effort, will be highly homogeneous. The vision of the people before the throne in Rev. 7:9 (“from every nation, tribe, people, and language”) is hard to wrap our brains around when we hardly like the people who are similar to us! Giving up on organized religion and being spiritual but not religious is akin to saying, “I don’t want to have to accommodate others.”

C.S. Lewis gives a powerful image of how this centrifugal tendency works out in his description of the “Grey Town” in The Great Divorce. The shades there tend to move away from each other until they are so far apart that they can no longer interact. It is a stark picture of eternal loneliness and isolation.

I would like to venture that religion often has a component of “what should be.” This is true both socially and theologically. And yes, I am speaking of what is called morality. Certainly a person can pursue this holiness alone, but there is a significant part of our growth that can only be accomplished in the company of others. We love ourselves. That is, we do what is best for ourselves, but even this we tend to mess up. We need others to help us better love ourselves well.

The deep darkness in us, however, is only revealed as we try to love others. That is when we discover the desire for comfort, security, and control prevents us from truly loving. This only happens in community, and because we are not capable of doing this, even together, we are pushed back on religion, organized religion.

A season of being apart is healthy, especially when we have been severely burned by the fires that rage in our ordered, religious communities. But in time we have to return to community.

“Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” (Heb. 10:23-25)

And finally we have Jesus’ promise: “For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them” (Matt. 18:20). There should be no question that Jesus will be with us as individuals, but there seems to be something more when we gather together, for in verse 19 he said, “Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven.”

This startling statement implies that community is a root of God’s further action among us. Why would we give that up?